James Baldwin was a 20th century author and essayist, as well as a Civil Rights leader. He wrote several non-fiction and fiction books and lived for a good while in France in self-imposed exile. Another point to note is that he was also an open homosexual in a time in this country where doing so would put one at a considerable disadvantage for ones career prospects.
I'm not prone to professing a singular "favorite author", but if one ever came close, it is indeed this man. I feel like he had his finger on the pulse of the black-white racial drama better and more consistently than almost anyone else I've ever read.
This video is of James Baldwin being interviewed about both Malcolm X and MLK Jr. and where he feels the country was headed at the time with respect to racial relations. Be sure to check out where the discussion is headed - that is, the question. It's lucid and as relevant today as it was then, albeit in a different light or context. It's meaning and substance today cannot be denied in the minds of all Americans.
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